1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to apparatus for monitoring a system with time in space and method therefor and more particularly relates to novel apparatus such as a unique MRI machine, a novel irrigation apparatus for testing the effectiveness of an irrigation system, a novel testing apparatus for determining the efficiency of a heating and/or cooling system, and the like, for testing or controlling a system in which fluid flows and where in the system fluid either dissipates in part or requires regeneration.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Presently apparatuses are known for monitoring testing or measuring a system in which a fluid that is flowing or substances in the fluid will dissipate in part as it traverses the system or will require regeneration. For example, MRI machines are used today to create images with or without administration of a tracer-contrast agent. Customarily, the machine is controlled to take a series of images at discrete time intervals and the images are then dynamically analyzed to obtain an output result. For example, dynamic studies of contrast enhancement in breast tumors have demonstrated that the rate of change in signal intensity is an important parameter for the distinction of breast masses, leading to pharmacokinetic studies. However, it is known that as a result of tumor heterogeneity, there are significant local variations in the time evolution of contrast enhancement, and, therefore, maintaining high spatial resolution in both the recording and analysis steps is very important. In a standard clinical MRI of the breast, it is difficult to achieve high spatial resolution and also maintain high temporal resolution. In most dynamic studies performed previously, the emphasis was on high temporal resolution (at the expense of spatial resolution) monitoring the equilibration in the intravascular space and early diffusion into the extracellular space of the tissue. As a consequence, in standard MRI machines the output results are sometimes inconclusive. The foregoing is also characteristic of other systems in which a fluid flows or a component thereof dissipates in part or requires regeneration, such as, for example, an irrigation system, a heating and cooling system and the like.